For the first time ever, the intrepid HackerNest team of caped crusaders will make the western pilgrimage to Kitchener / Waterloo. Yes, citizens, the journey shall be long, arduous, and dangerous, but we must forge ahead, for we must carry our message forward. We come bearing free beer and good tidings!

Our lead event organizers are both Waterloo Mechatronics alumni!

Jaclyn: ex-Microsoftie, now building her hardware startup! Rock climber, do-gooder.

Neville: Was at RIM/BB, now still spends most of his time in Waterloo at Avvasi. Loves robots, and mojitos.

Know any Waterlooish tech people who are kinda cranky because there aren't Tech Socials where they're at? If you do, you should probably let 'em know about this one.

Hey Shaharris..another great event..despite the bad weather a super turnout...I personally made some great connections...I have some video to edit/upload..anyone wishing to help with that please let me know...

Great meeting everyone that came out tonight! If I missed exchanging business cards, send me a shout at my first name @brownieinmotion.ca. And big thanks to Shaharris for organizing tonight's event #respectbossmonP.S. Sorry for the duplicate posts (internet hiccup)

Anybody still available to drive? 1 caveat... I need to be picked up as I will be bringing a couple of computers, a monitor and a slew of other things in order to video stream tonight’s event. I know, that may be a pain. Closest intersection to me is Bloor/Sherbourne.

Hey folks, T-2 days till we land on KW. Looking forward to seeing awesome new faces, some old friends, long-lost connections, and having a cold one! RSVPs are picking up. Come, bring a friend. We ♥ people. Good people. Fun people. Smart people. Good-fun-smart people. 7pm start, but if you're off work and there early, we'll be there, so drop-on in!

In case of any overnight stays, here's the best option at Delta about a km down the street, rooms start at $109 CAD/night and we can tack on the Communitech group rate ($20 off). Here's the hotel info:

Hey folks, looks like we'll be at Communitech for this one. Looking forward to checking out their digs, the awesome people there, and the cool and ever-growing tech scene in KW! Who's up for post-event drinks at the pub maybe? [we are].

RSVP to get a nametag. This is important, because people without nametags aren't even really people. There, we said it. :) Check us out >>> Facebook | Twitter

HackerNest is an international nonprofit community movement focused on building supportive Silicon Valley like tech communities in every city - strengthening local tech ecosystems globally through unpretentious social events and hackathons. We’re nurturing cohesive communities today to empower them with more relevant and accessible peer-based tech education tomorrow.

Connecting people is awesome. And community good breeds fab karma.

We cram smart, accomplished people into a room with free beer. Our relaxed, down-to-earth Tech Socials are now Canada’s largest tech meetups.

Global. We want an international network of HackerNest “splinter cells” to pop up everywhere – from underserved cities to high-growth innovation centers – to rescue nerds from isolated basements, offices, and code tunnel vision.

We're not scienticians, but the formula seems to work: we became Canada's largest tech meetups in a year, before even leaving Toronto. Today we have "splinter cells" in multiple cities internationally.

Our goal is to complement and strengthen existing nerd ecosystems – we come in peace. This isn't a business; nobody owns HackerNest. Conceptually, it is the ideal of a strong and supportive tech community - pretty much anyone that isn't a jerk can be a part of it.

Interested in running HackerNest in your city? Take a look at the FAQ.

Format: Relaxed. Hang, talk tech, occasionally a speaker, plot to take over the world, etc.

Where: Usually in the large private office of a tech company (have a venue?)

At any given HackerNest meetup, you may find people who are:

developing incredibly snazzy Ruby (most likely on Rails) applications - heady hardcore designer typesPHP/Perl/.NET/Python/django addicts - ...Fortran devs?! - looking for a tech/entrepreneur/new business story to cover - Objective-C experts and iPhone/iPad/Apple product pundits - engineers and managers and CTOs looking for co-founders to join their angel/VC-backed tech startup - looking to write articles/stories about the obscure/interesting/hilarious hacks you've pulled off - totally oblivious and just wandered in because they heard there was booze (!?) - building a top-secret app out of their basement that's going to change the way the world does X; like "Facebook for Squirrels" - scrambling to find a partner to work with on a well-paying contract that's just a wee bit too much workload for the anticipated deadline - heroes, because they're part of the burgeoning community that will reverse all this insane brain-drain - incredibly talented, smart, entrepreneurial go-getters who are absolutely dangerous to the status quo - pretty bloody interesting, because seriously, if they're coming out for drinks ON A MONDAY (or Tuesday, or Wednesday) NIGHT... they've gotta be

Chances are, you'll fit right in if you're a(n):

software or hardware hacker/h4ck3r (or maybe just a hack)

coder/developer/programmer/brogrammerdesigner, UX-oriented, or just like making things pretty